Beating is a normal English idiom. While I do sympathize with anyone suffering from abuse, I highly doubt anyone is actually suffering from use of the word.
I agree with stndef. "Flowers after beating" is a very direct evocation of physical abuse in an intimate relationship. Whether or not you think it's appropriate.
I their point was: the comment they were replying to ("Beating is a normal English idiom") was being disingenuous.
Saying something like "the benchmarks took a beating in the new version" would be inoffensive but "flowers after the beating" is much more specifically about abuse in a relationship.
I don't think "Whether or not you think it's appropriate" was meant to say, don't worry it's fine. I think it just meant, let's not justify by pretending that it's about something different than it obviously is.
There are all kinds of language registers for communication. From formal business speak to 'locker room banter'. What is appropriate or otherwise depends entirely on the participants of the conversation. So, it depends on what kind of conversation we're trying to have.
I think this post's usage is meant deliberately to be a bit edgy, to illustrate how badly Microsoft has behaved.
An encouragement to be mindful of language, and therefore discuss what shared context we're trying to build, shouldn't be so controversial in a self-professed 'thoughtful' [0] forum.
Personally, data point of 1, I think it's a bit distasteful, and would prefer to participate in a community that doesn't routinely use that kind of langauge.
> An encouragement to be mindful of language, and therefore discuss what shared context we're trying to build, shouldn't be so controversial in a self-professed 'thoughtful' [0] forum.
I think you guys complaining about provocative title and not not the substance of what is said, is what people are taking issue with.
If I didn't know better, I would honestly think it is concern trolling.
> I think it's a bit distasteful, and would prefer to participate in a community that doesn't routinely use that kind of langauge.
The entire point is that it is provocative and hyperbolic to make a statement. Often to make a statement you have to act outside what is considered polite norms and ruffle the feathers.
If Sam had given this a nice polite title (as per your preference), not as many people would have taken notice of it.
I hope you can take on trust that this is a genuine, exploration of the original point about language. And FTR I have a very low opinion of MS and have had since the late 90s.
There are usually all kinds of twists and turns in a HN discussion. And it's not like we're discussing the background colour or something far off-topic, the title is a pretty noticeable part of the article. I don't think it should be verboten to discuss these things.
I agree that transgressive speech is an important tool, and tone policing is generally bad news.
> I hope you can take on trust that this is a genuine, exploration of the original point about language.
I find it hard believe that any discussion like this is genuine and I am deeply suspicious of people that complain about hyperbolic and provocative language.
Moreover, I think complaining about it like people have is here is verging on being ridiculous tbh.
Again if I didn't know better (i.e. I don't think this is happen) I would actually think it deliberate to run interference.
I don't think it's fair to expect people to autocensor based on ill-defined, circular notions of taste and appropriateness, at least not in edge cases where these notions clearly vary from person to person. If the reasoning is something like "an abuse victim might read this and feel bad" or "a stupid person might confuse social license for edginess with license for being a bad person", then that's a discussion we can have.
> An encouragement to be mindful of language, and therefore discuss what shared context we're trying to build, shouldn't be so controversial in a self-professed 'thoughtful' [0] forum.
I don't understand how HN's news guidelines apply to a blogger writing an article on their own blog. The controversial language was found in the article. It wasn't found in the thread you're replying to.
It’s actually more triggering / offensive that you brought up abuse when no one was talking about abuse. This site is for adults who understand the concept of analogies. You just wanted to bring up the topic of abuse for whatever reason. Why?
The article comes back to the abuse analogy multiple times. If you want to defend that as fine, go for it, but in no way is it a new topic that the poster here brought up.
Oh please, TFA has a title of "Flowers after the beating" - its a direct reference to domestic abuse which attempts to equate Microsofts behaviour and that of a domestic abuser.
Username checks out, but you might want to check with your mother about how she feels about this comparison.
TFA brings up abuse not stndef.
An analogy is "a thing which is comparable to something else in significant respects" and stndef is right to point out that microsoft behavior, while abusive, is not comparable to domestic abuse "in significant respects". Not even close.
The TFA title is sensational for effect and in very poor taste.
Can confirm as well, although to my recollection it just shows up as if it's a word the transcription model heard, not "[foreign]" in brackets like with "[Music]" or "[Applause]". It's especially weird to me because I recall the auto-transcriptions being reasonably serviceable when they first rolled them out, only to degrade over time to the point where it was hallucinating the word "foreign" and dropping letters from words or using weird abbreviations (like "koby" for "kilobyte", "TBTE" for "terabyte", or, most memorably weirdly, transcribing the phrase "nanosecond-by-nanosecond" as "nond by nanc") if it didn't decide it heard another one entirely.
I also noticed a couple of months ago that YouTube seems to have quietly rolled out a new auto-transcription model that can make reasonable guesses at where capitalization, punctuation, and sentence boundaries should go. It seems to have degraded even more rapidly than the old one, falling victim to the same kinds of transcription errors. Although the new one has a different hallucination in silence and noise that it wasn't able to classify (which, incidentally, its ability to recognize things like music and applause seems worse than the old one's): where the old model would have hallucinated the word "foreign", the new one thinks it's hearing the word "heat", often repeated ("Heat. Heat.").
I don’t have hearing loss but the best way I’ve found to not miss important notifications is a smart watch. Game changing to ensure my wife and I don’t miss each other’s messages around school pickup or anything else important. With an apple watch you can make the vibration pretty unmissable. We both have almost all other notifications silenced so it’s not overly noisy either. I never use sound for any kind of notification anymore - even when expecting important calls.
I can't help, but get generated vibes from the photos of the team. It just might be the focus of the camera, alongside my lack of trust for any images I see online these days!
Note how the team member 'Pedro Echanove' has a mobile device on his screen with a physical keyboard. The desk in front of him doesn't have a chair. The team member 'Carlos Rodríguez' has a large screen on a desk behind his with lines of code, for what purpose?
Maybe it's real, maybe it's just staged for the photo, but it could be hints towards some weirdness.
I'm gonna say the people are real but they're green screened onto AI backgrounds. Although the man leaning on the pillar one is just uncanny for multiple reasons.
I'm not a professional, and I'm not diagnosing, but I am diagnosed autistic and I share some of what you're talking about here.
I'm sensitive to noise, smells, lights and vibrations (living next to a very busy road, I can feel almost every large non-electric vehicle go by -- makes working from home hard at points).
Worth reading into if you have the energy. I do know folks who are diagnosed with schizophrenia and they seem to have an underlying component of some neurodivergence (arguably schizophrenia should also be considered neurodivergence) and went through an extreme burnout/traumatic event.
I moved twice in the last few years. Immediately after moving I was completely unable to sleep. Too bright. Too loud. What are these noises? What is that vibration? For me, it fades after a few weeks. The train can be rumbling by with the horn going and I'll sleep right through it now. I think maybe for some, that filter never builds up. Not sure how to articulate it but it does seem a significant component of both autism and schizophrenia (which in some ways seem to be almost opposites) is a difficulty in developing that sort of filtering-out of the constant sensory bombardment we're all under.
Acclimitisation can be hard. In some cases I can put things to the back of my mine, but often it's just hard or not possible.
Certainly in my experience and from talking to others who identify or have been diagnosed similarly, in the majority of cases you don't get used to certain things. You can't acclimitise and that's why a load of people who are autistic aren't employed.
I might seem okay in the office, but what isn't seen is my complete inability to function at home if there have been too many inputs and distractions. Lucky I can work from home a couple of times a week and my hours are flexible in that I can start earlier so not to travel into the city when it's busy -- busses are quiet at 05:00/06:00 thankfully!
Having a small office I share with a few people helps. My last place went all in on the open-planned office and it was hell. I can't see how anyone is getting much work done in environments like that, haha.
Schizophrenia is certainly neurodivergence, as far as I know. I've often seen it depicted that autism and schizophrenia are roughly on opposite sides of neurotypical:
- Autism can make one prone to detail-oriented thinking, focusing on small details, requiring logical connections to understand and apply ideas. Constraints are well understood and considered. This can result in stuff like OCD.
- Schizophrenia can make one prone to disconnected thinking, focusing on big pictures, fitting together ideas that may seem entirely unrelated. Even constraints that seem obvious may be completely ignored. This can result in stuff like conspiracy theories and convoluted delusions. Delusions happen because beliefs may not be constrained by what's actually realistic, the big picture could be more prominent.
I don't know how true this analogy is, but it certainly seems interesting to consider.
Very insteresting, my father thinks I'm autistic, while some psychiatrist concluded for "Hebephrenic schizophrenia". In my developer work I tend to rush things a bit, maybe because I don't know how long I'll feel in peace, but if I can really find peace, then I deeply focus like an autist. Also I'm not associal (except the fact I don't like cigarette, so I'll avoid crowd due to that unfortunatly) I usually engage conversations with anyone, helps breaking my loneliness, and that's not really a trait of autists I believe (who are more shy/introvert/associal no?)
> I usually engage conversations with anyone, helps breaking my loneliness, and that's not really a trait of autists I believe (who are more shy/introvert/associal no?)
I think 'autistics' is a better term here; 'autists' can make... not the best impression.
Anyway: no, autistics aren't necessarily more shy/introverted/asocial. I'm autistic and I'm definitely not that way; I usually try to connect to as many people as I can and I have to speak to people essentially every day or else I get extremely lonely/depressed. Part of this is probably due to ADHD and possibly also B(orderline)PD, but it's also because that's just the way I am.
> arguably schizophrenia should also be considered neurodivergence
Isn't it? My understanding of the word is "anyone who experiences the world differently from the social 'normal'", which would certainly include schizophrenia and other kinds of mental disorders.
I'm with you, I thought neurodivergent included any folks whose brain chemistry was different than the 'regular' baseline. Bipolar, schizophrenic, etc.
> arguably schizophrenia should also be considered neurodivergence
Nope never!
I have experience with schizophrenia and it can never be confused with anything else. The person with it is devoid of reality and does not know they are sick. They resist treatment and sometimes would rather go homeless, stop eating or taking care of themselves, in order to avoid treatment. They pull down everyone in their lives trying to help them, and it really takes a toll on family and relationships.
I couldn't agree more with you. I've got a brother who's been diagnosed with schizophrenia. He's in denial and it's a constant worry that he will stop taking his meds again. It's a brutal, life-destroying illness if it's not managed. His lows are truly soul-destroying to witness.
I see where you're coming from, but a prosthetic arm is someone's arm. Mentally it very quickly can become something you identify with, like a prosthetic arm basically being YOUR arm.
When you then have your prosthetic then being an advertisement, it can have an impact on your relationship with the device.
I don't want someone branding my arm and I can see why others would feel the same.
You're right -- I totally misread what you said. Sorry!
I think tattoo does imply more of a permanence and familiarity in regards to the relationship someone would have with a tattoo on a part of their body they're born with, but I do see your point as well.
Speaking as someone who is autistic and has significant hearing loss, open offices are a form of torture. It might sound like hyperbole, but I promise it's not!
I enjoy working in a team, but in more enclosed spaces. In my current job I share a room with two other people and it's just right (apart from when all of us are in remote meetings at the same time, but you win some and you lose some).
Saying that here as someone that isn't fond of the Windows experience these days, but the two are not relatable.